Crayola Kids

It’s that time of summer when kids are still running through sprinklers but the grocery store shelves are crammed with notebooks, braded folders, and boxes of Crayola Crayons.

I’m a Crayola kid. Still.

I love the smell of a brand-new box and the sight of all those pretty pointy colors lined up in rows. Getting a new box of crayons was always a treat. Most school supply lists called for 12 or 24, but sometimes my mom would sneak an extra box into the cart. My favorite was the box of 64 with the built in sharpener in the back. With the 64 you got the basics, but you also got special colors, such as periwinkle, which was good for sky, and silver, which had all sorts of possibilities.

The crayons have changed a lot. Not only do they have several languages listed on the crayons now (red, rojo, and rouge) but the colors themselves are different. The new box of 64 includes granny smith apple and robin’s egg blue and tickle me pink.

Some of my favorite memories of elementary school were when the teacher would pass out big sheets of manila paper and tell us it was “art time.”

I don’t think kids do “art time” anymore. Not in our schools, anyway. Yes, they have a structured art class, which is great. But the school day has become so programmed now and every single minute (every minute) is designated for some specific curriculum objective.

Same for P.E. They don’t just go play kick ball or do scooter boards. My kids come home with Fitness Grams detailing their body mass index and whether their sit-up tally is “within range” for a child their age.

I can appreciate structure. I certainly appreciate the school’s focus on fitness. But I wonder, when do kids just get to be kids anymore?

I look around at the middle school bunch, where children are trying out for sports teams. When I was growing up I tried out for three sports and played two. (The basketball team didn’t want me, so that was a disappointment, but I survived.) Now I see kids trying out for seventh-grade sports teams, such as soccer or football, and they have literally spent eight years playing that sport, including attending clinics and summer camps. Gone are the days when your child can waltz into middle school, try a few things, and see what fits.

What concerns me is that we are so programmed now, there is little time for discovery.

There is little time to open the box of crayons and simply explore. From pre-kindergarten, so many children now have their schedules programmed with soccer practices and piano lessons and cheer camp. Where is the time to just grab a ball and go play in the park? Where is the time to doodle on a piece of manila paper?

The other day I was chatting with another mom about this trend and she told me she believes that in our push to make kids excel at something, many kids are missing their calling because they never get the chance to discover it.

Do you remember some of the unstructured activities you did as a kid? Do you think kids today are missing out, or gaining an advantage?

We had music class about once a month where a piano teacher came and banged out songs like “She’ll Be Comin’ Around the Mountain” and “This Land is Your Land” and we all sang along. We didn’t have to know how to read music or play an instrument to participate–we just belted out the songs. It was great.

I love big boxes of crayons and markers. Sharpie makes a big pack of colored markers that I drool over, but the price is too high for something I know will get scattered by my kids. I don’t have my kids in sports. We tested the waters when they were younger, but hey’d rather be with their friends or spend time with a book. They have a lot of me in them. Middle daughter spent several hours Tuesday coloring with markers in her room in one of those complicated coloring books. That’s what I would have done, too.

I love the Crayola crayons too-and buy them for the local shelter just so I can smell them for a few days until it’s time to turn them in.
My kids have been out of school for a few years but even in the late 90’s I worried about “over-scheduling” them after school because of all the stuff they did in school. Today, it sounds even worse.
I’m glad there are parents who still try to leave their kids time to grow-outside of structured activities.

They are totally missing out, whether it’s from too much structure or too much television/video game time. When I was little and consequently, when my son was little, mindless time in front of imagination-squelching electronic boxes was severely limited. My son had to actually think of something fun to do! I know, amazing.

He had one sport to participate in and the rest of the time was his…to explore the limits of his imagination.

Today he’s an artist and actually makes a living as a copywriter in the ad world. Creative to the core. His discovery. His life.

I think kids are missing so much! They don’t have creativity! No imagination! I can remember my children playing for hours with a cardboard box. It was a boat, a car, a fort, endless possibilities. My grandchildren don’t get this. I loved to color with my children, and you will find at least 4 coloring books at my house (2 for the girls and 2 for the boys). And I color with them. My fridge is covered with their art!

Laura, I gifted my granddaughter with the 64 color box on her 2nd birthday, along with every Disney princess coloring book I could find. I’m not sure who was more excited, me or her. We color almost every day. 🙂

I love the smell of a new box of crayons, too. In fact, last Christmas I received several boxes (from 24 to 64 (my first ever box of 64)) and coloring books galore. Yes, I am an adult colorist.

I remember getting manilla paper (always thought, for the longest time that the teacher called it “vanilla paper” because of the color, like vanilla ice cream) and drawing to my heart’s content.

I don’t think children get the opportunities to draw in school like they used to. There is too much content required for testing of competencies any more. And many parents have too much to do (trying to put food on the tablet, keeping their households going, etc.) to sit down and color and draw with their children. Besides, electronic devices also have taken away so much imagination time.

Hopefully, if parents and grandparents introduce the tools (crayons, paper, coloring books), some children will pick up the stuff and discover the magic of creating “art.”

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Bio:

Allison Brennan

Allison Brennan is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of nearly three dozen romantic thrillers and mysteries, including the Lucy Kincaid series and the Max Revere series. She lives in Northern California with her husband, five children, and assorted pets.